WebLog?

I just wrote the following piece and submitted it to NewMusicBox.com. I think it has some validity, although I am trying to suss-out how to implement it with my own site - I think it's going to take some major revision. It's an exciting thought (to me, anyway).

Composers are constantly looking for exposure. I think that all of us, at some level, hope to burst forth from the bubble that is “new music” and have some kind of mass appeal; à la Copland (but bigger!) might be the thought. Of course we all strive towards whatever artistic ends we might have the skill or luck to achieve, but there is, in this media-dominated society, a bastion of antiquated form. It seems strange to say it aloud given that the advent of this particular device was maybe two decades ago, perhaps less in the compositional realm. I am writing, of course, about personal web pages. Each of us who is serious about our compositional endeavor has been at least counseled to get a web page. Depending on our technical prowess we trim (or pay somebody to do so) our pages like commercial Christmas trees (redundant?) in the hope that we can appeal to any who stumble by our nook of the internet.

There is a logical oversight in all of this. If we are sequestered in our new music world, then our web pages are as well to some degree. Certainly the facility and accessibility of the net might lead someone by chance to encounter our pages, but there is little reason to say that they would be interested or know what they are looking at. Moreover, most composer web pages fall into one of three categories: the super-minimal self-ad, the gaudy graphics-bedazzled self-ad, and the barebones-of-html self-ad. (Certainly there are suave, well-chiseled web pages, but we all know that hired help usually makes those.) In the end all that matters is that these web pages are our only outlets of ‘free’ (minus hosting fee) publicity. We can inform, debate, update, expose, etc. on these pages. Why do so few do this?

Web pages seem to have fallen into a resume-derived script. We need a page about concerts, upcoming works, bio, pictures (if you can avoid breaking the lens, in which case I envy you), audio files, news, etc. Some people have figured out the email mailer, but that is far from the streamlined blog style of an RSS feed or the like. Why shouldn’t we style our pages after blogs, updating our throngs of fans about what we’re working on by talking about what we’re reading, writing, listening to, etc. If nothing else it could be a rewarding creative reflection, and at best it could give some much-needed writing practice (in words) to many who may need it. Access to this information by listeners could be crucial to understanding artistic vision, exposing new art, or anything in-between.

Cell phones. We have them. iPhones, Blackberries: many composers I know, despite our pay, have them. Smart phones seem to be the future of everyone’s communications arsenal. Why, then, are we not taking advantage of this? At a given concert I would wager that half the audience has smart phones. If they are confronted with a piece by a (gasp!) living composer and a stodgy program note they probably want more if they aren’t a classical music buff. Since the internet (or interweb, as I prefer) is now everywhere, all the time, they could have access, given our work on the right kind of web pages, to a plethora of information pertaining to compositional process, personal taste, life events influencing our art, etc. which would never in a million years make it onto a “respectable” program. We have the opportunity to create great visibility not just for our would-be professional personas but for our honest-to-goodness artistic selves, with all of our faults and prejudices on display for any curious listener or reader to measure out.

That sounds like the kind of publicity I want. I’m going to overhaul my website by the end of August. Give it a try (or at least start an adjunct blog on Blogger or Wordpress) – it could be a great parallel creative outlet that pays off in publicity.